Jill Stanek's Empty Words On Anti-Abortion Activists And The Children Of Their EnemiesTopic: NewsBusters

In a Jan. 20 NewsBusters post, anti-abortion activist Jill Stanek complains that a new real-housewives reality show includes the daughter of an abortion doctor, then oddly says, "We in the pro-life movement don’t believe children should be punished for the sins of their fathers."

As Stanek's attack shows, that's simply not true. Additionally, given one recent chance Stanek had to denounce targeting children of an anti-abortion activist's enemy, she punted.

Last year, anti-abortion activists started handing out fliers depicting the landlord of an abortion clinic as akin to Nazis. Stanek wrote that she was asked to condemn it, "but I couldn’t. I responded by asking what was inaccurate about it."

That was followed by anti-abortion protesters picketing the school that the landlord's 11-year-old daughter attends. Rather than condemn such behavior -- as her NewsBusters statement suggests she would -- Stanek instead expressed no opinion and threw the question out to her readers: "Do you think involving the children of either abortion proponents or opponents is fair game?"

It seems that when it actually comes down to proving that she believes that children of their targets shouldn't be targeted, Stanek can't back up her words.

A Jan. 16 WND article by Bob Unruh details Wenzel poll results claiming that 73 percent of respondents said that they didn't mind that state and local governments were acquiring "military-style equipment and armaments." Unruh then quotes Wenzel offering up his own invented interpretation of the results:

“This is perhaps because, the survey shows, a wide majority of Americans doubt their local or state police would ever engage in the imposition of some sort of martial law. Such imposition would severely restrict personal freedoms, but 59 percent said they just don’t think such a thing would happen here in America,” he continued.

“That is largely because 51 percent said they cannot conceive of any circumstances or actions by government that would so cause them to agree it is time for a citizen revolution against the government. Just 18 percent said they could conceive of something the government could do to cause them to want to revolt.

“This is a testament to the longstanding stability that the country has known, but also spells a risk of tyranny. If government leaders know the citizenry is unwilling to revolt and they know their law enforcement agencies are well-equipped to put down any uprising with military-style weaponry, one could argue that those leaders might be tempted to impose tyranny on the country in some form or another,” he said.

The next day, Unruh served up some more Wenzel results, this time claiming that "one in seven Americans believes that the nation eventually will be ruled by a dictator." But the questions are decidedly leading:

In world history, whenever a democratic society similar to ours has failed, it has been followed by a dictatorship – usually a brutal dictatorship. If the current American federal government were to fail, what do you think would be the most likely outcome?

Some opinion leaders in America today say the current federal government of the United States is so badly in debt and is so bloated as a dysfunctional bureaucracy, and faces such grave threats from foreign enemies, that it is unlikely to last much longer. How likely do you think it is that our national government will collapse during your lifetime from the combination of these serious problems facing the country?

How likely do you think it is that the country will collapse during the next 20 years?

How likely do you think it is that the country will collapse during the next 10 years?

“At the beginning of a second presidential term, you generally expect the country to be in full-bore optimism, in part as an endorsement of the re-elected president and in part a reflection of the nation settled in its current course,” said Fritz Wenzel, president of his strategies organization.

“We saw that with Reagan, we saw that with Clinton, and we saw that with George W. Bush. But that is not what we find with Obama,” he said.

“The country is already in full-on depression, as just 34 percent said they think things in America are headed in the right direction. Even among Democrats, just 62 percent said they think things are headed in the right direction, an abysmal figure for the president’s own fellow party members.”

He continued: “There is just no sugar-coating this – America may have liked Obama more than Romney, but they have no confidence in his leadership. This spells nothing but tough sledding for the nation over the next four years. Politically, it’s bound to get very ugly as the nation continues in a downward spiral and leaders in Washington point fingers across the political aisle. Forget solutions and reform for the next four years – the only thing coming from Washington will be blame for our sorry condition. This survey finding reflects that the nation is in the process of giving up hope.”

Wenzel somehow manages to extrapolate all of that from a single poll finding that 34 percent of respondents say the country is moving in the wrong direction.

A particularly nasty example of the Media Research Center's anti-gay agenda pops up in a Jan. 21 CNSNews.com article by editor in chief Terry Jeffrey, who puts "love" in scare quotes when referring to gays:

President Barack Obama opened his second inaugural address by quoting the statement from the preamble to the Declaration of Independence that all men “are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights."

He then went on to say that if men were in fact created equal, then homosexual “love” must be equal as well.

[...]

A bit later in his speech, Obama returned to the theme of God creating all men equal, and this time tied it directly to his belief that the “law” should extend equal treatment to “the love” of homosexuals.

Jeffrey does not explain why "love" is in scare quotes, or why he apparently doesn't believe that homosexuals can love each other.

In his Jan. 20 WorldNetDaily column, Rick Santorum complained that President Obama issued "23 executive orders to be signed by the president to attempt to address gun violence in the wake of the Sandy Hook tragedy. Once again, rather than respect the rule of law and the checks and balances in our system, President Obama is unilaterally implementing public policy without the normal process that involves legislation, debate and passage by a vote of Congress."

In fact, Obama did not sign "23 executive orders." As Slate's Dave Weigel details, Obama 23 executive actions on various issues connected to gun massacres and asked Congress to consider a few reform bills.

Santorum goes on to cite as evidence that Obama "has found ways to circumvent our system and impose his views and vision":

Two days after he took office, President Obama rescinded by executive order the “Mexico City policy,” which prevents foreign aid going to organizations that perform or promote abortions. No legislation passed, no debate, just an executive order.

But the website for Santorum's 2012 presidential campaign lists under the "Executive Orders, Rulemaking and other Executive Branch Actions" he would take if elected is "Reinstitute the Mexico City Policy to stop tax-payer funding or promotion of abortion overseas."

No mention of putting it to a debate.

In other words, Santorum is criticizing the very same behavior he vowed to engaged in if he was elected president. What a hypocrite.

Despite his utter hatred for President Obama, CNSNews.com editor in chief Terry Jeffrey couldn't keep President Obama from getting re-elected. So, to mark Obama's inauguration, Jeffrey has penned a trio of sour-grapes articles expressing his displeasure with the president by using cherry-picked statistics:

That last number is rather egregiously cherry-picked. According to the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, long-term demographic trends are responsible for about half of the decline in labor force participation, which are factors out of Obama's control. Needless to say, Jeffrey makes no mention of this, though he does concede that about half of the decline he cites is due to an increase in retired workers collecting Social Security benefits.

Remember that Jeffrey isn't really all that interested in reporting the full truth; he just wants to destroy Obama.

Meanwhile, the Obama-hate at CNS is so pervasive that its employees can't (or won't) take any joy in the inauguration ceremony itself. Penny Starr pulled one of CNS' trademark word-count nitpicks to complain that the invocation didn't not mention God sufficiently to her liking.

His purpose is to keep the evil Republicans on the hot seat over their threat not to raise the debt ceiling and over revenue “fairness,” all the while claiming he’s pushing for a balanced approach, by which he means a completely unbalanced, one-sided approach that focuses on tax increases only, ignores spending cuts and entitlements and even includes new spending. If his ploy were to succeed, it would guarantee that America would go bankrupt, yet Obama is masquerading as the responsible one. It’s surreal, and I swear I wouldn’t believe it is occurring if I weren’t witnessing it with my own eyes.

Linking Obama with Hitler and Stalin will, indeed, win them over, provided they’re sufficiently stupid. It is thoroughly possible to be: a) the worst president in American history; b) a dreadful fraud and a liar; c) a deliberate saboteur of America’s well-being; d) a blood-drainer of America’s military capacity; e) a friend of America’s most dangerous enemies and an enemy of America’s most valuable ally in the Middle East; f) the kind of narcissist whose personal priorities could endanger American security … need I go on? It’s possible to be all those and many more and still fall far short of ranking up there with the two most murderous and evil dictators of the last century.

Some Americans are already calling for a “third term” for Obama. Others are calling for impeachment. I seek enlargement of the anti-Obama segment of the American population. I fear the Hitler-Stalin play will bring additional people to Obama’s side, people disgusted with Obama’s enemies’ willingness to jettison all sense of proportion.

A senior official of the Obama “administration” has gotten himself into hot water by telling Britain what to do. Obama’s view, apparently, is that it is in the interests of the United States that Britain should remain a mere satrapy or vassal state of the hated European tyranny-by-clerk, and should not think of leaving.

Far more dangerous and terrifying than Obama’s utter disregard for the Constitution is the abject treason of this president; this also remains largely unknown due to the mass media. While Americans have been encouraged to perceive Obama as just another president muddling through during a challenging period (apart from his historic First Black President status), it doesn’t take much digging to determine the direction in which he is taking us.

Throw in the testimony of proven, reliable sources some highly suspicious phenomena, and the situation becomes truly petrifying.

Now, some of you may say, “But wait, Obama knows exactly what he’s doing. He’s no buffoon.”

I both agree and disagree. Yes, the “progressive” dogma that courses through his veins – a mind-altering hallucinogen that gives liberals the munchies for power – is, indeed, inherently sinister.

Still, he believes it with every ounce of his nicotine-shriveled heart.

By deliberately deconstructing America’s constitutional republic – our free-market form of government – and replacing it with a Euro-socialist, moral relativist amalgam of his liking, this misguided anti-colonialist radical thinks – truly believes – that he’s doing the right thing.

So, just as occurred in 1776 with King George III, its time to legally remove the tyrant Obama from our body politic and cleanse the nation of his evil and destructive march to abolish our liberty and freedoms.

We may not as yet have found the best and final way to this end, but we must open our hearts and minds to our God, seek his guidance and press on. No one wants to see violence, so we must solemnly pray that we can achieve the tyrant Obama’s removal peacefully before it is too late.

One story is currently consuming the American media, and not just the sports media. That story, of course, is whether Notre Dame All-American linebacker Manti Te’o conspired to fabricate his seemingly tragic relationship with imaginary girlfriend Lennay Kekua or whether he is a victim of a cruel hoax.

Much is at stake – or so we are told. If Te’o proves to be a participant, NFL scouts will question his character and downgrade his stock in the upcoming NFL draft. For those who care, Deadspin has some excellent reporting on this story, better reporting in fact than anyone in the major media has done on that other Hawaiian fabricator of girl friends, President Barack Obama.

President Obama is hellbent on using his 23 executive orders not only to take away America’s guns, but he is deputizing all doctors to snitch on any of their patients who are gun owners. Obama’s progressive plan to eradicate the Second Amendment is systematic – first by registration, second by regulation, third by confiscation, and finally by mass extermination.

Still, Obama has more secrets than any would-be gun purchaser I have ever met in my life. Yet he has Secret Service protection. He obviously sees the value of armed defense or he would dispatch those agents tout suite. He obviously cares about the safety of his own children because they are provided with armed security, too. He just doesn’t think your kids should have any – even if his is provided courtesy of the taxpayers of the U.S. and yours is provided with your own money and time.

So, I say it’s time for Obama to submit to some public background checks.

How is it that with so many secrets regarding his life and identity, he has the cojones to demand background checks on Joe Q. Citizen, who simply wants to exercise his constitutional rights to protect his life, liberty and property?

The latest example comes in a Jan. 18 NewsBusters post approvingly quoting Rush Limbaugh's manufactured outrage that CBS host Bob Schieffer's comparison of "President Obama taking on the gun lobby to America defeating the Nazis in World War II" isn't the target of more outrage.

Of course, Schieffer didn't actually do that -- as the MRC itself transcribed it, Schieffer said a long list of things, including "defeating the Nazis," were "a much more formidable task than taking on the gun lobby."

But why quibble with facts when Sheppard has a political enemy to attack? He called Schieffer's statement an "absurd tirade." Well, Sheppard does know from absurd tirades, having defended the honor of Richard Nixon just a couple of weeks ago.

As far as media outrage of absurd tirades go: Where was Sheppard when his boss, Brent Bozell, called President Obama a "skinny ghetto crackhead"? To our knowledge, Sheppard is not on the record denouncing this vicious insult, even as he decries the lack of civility in political discourse.

Does the Media Research Center keep Sheppard employed despite regularly exhibiting such utterly blatant double standards, or because of them?

WorldNetDaily isn't going to tell its readers the full truth about the inauguration prayer breakfast WND editor Joseph Farah was briefly removed from.

A Jan. 19 WND article by Drew Zahn repeats the discredited company line that Media Matters (disclosure: my employer) maliciously reported that Rev. Merrie Turner, prayer breakfast organizer, had removed Farah from the guest list. As we've detailed, Turner never asked Media Matters for a correction or to change what he had previously said, and Farah had been, in fact, briefly removed from the guest list on the breakfast's website.

Zahn makes no mention of the fact that Media Matters responded to WND's previous attack, instead presenting Turner's current story as the truth and failing to question his discrepancies further.

The remainder of Zahn's article is carefully written to keep up the fiction that the prayer breakfast is not attacking Obama specifically -- merely praying that "America will not continue its path of defiance unto judgment" -- ignoring the fact that the guest list includes two of the most vicious Obama-haters in America in Farah and pat Boone, and the remainder are either Republican politicans or right-wing activists.

Armstrong Williams Doesn't Want Lance Armstrong To Get The Public Forgiveness He GotTopic: Newsmax

In his Jan. 15 Newsmax column, Armstrong Williams bemoans the idea that Lance Armstrong will get a pass for his misdeeds:

Lance Armstrong should be held fully accountable and we shouldn’t be so quick to forgive the horrible offenses that he has committed. He can only look skyward for true forgiveness.

We owe it to today’s youth not to so quickly forgive Lance Armstrong and not to just sweep this whole sordid saga under the rug and let him move on with his life.

Americans are a remarkably forgiving society and everyone makes mistakes, but this is something altogether different. A lie of this magnitude cannot be permitted to be trivialized.

Lance is just the last in a string of public figures who let us all down and then are given a free pass. Bill Clinton violated one of the 10 commandments, inside the Oval Office and then lied under oath and to the public about it.

Today he has been redeemed, and is revered by the Democratic Party.

Tiger Woods admitted to a series of infidelities and, while his golf name has never returned to the same stratospheric levels, has largely moved on.

If we give Lance Armstrong a pass then the real message we send our children that you can make hundreds of millions of dollars in sponsorships and achieve world-wide fame by cheating — you just have to make sure that you don’t get caught or you might be embarrassed.

Williams doesn't mention that he himself has benefitted from that very same "remarkably forgiving" American society.

Back in the previous decade, Williams accepted $240,000 from the Bush administration to promote its No Child Left Behind education policy on his syndicated TV show and in his columns, something he unethically failed to disclose to his viewers and readers. His career suffered a temporary setback, but today, not only is Williams continuing to write his column, he has a daily show on satellite radio.

As with Tiger Woods, the public has largely moved on from Williams' shady dealings. Why doesn't he want Lance Armstrong to take part in the benefit of public forgiveness that he received?

Erik Rush has been veeringoff the deep end of late with epidemic levels of Obama derangement. He's cranking it up again with his Jan. 16 WorldNetDaily column that cites that old WND staple, the untraceable, unverifiable anonymous source.

After claiming "the testimony of proven, reliable sources" back up his attacks on President Obama, he then writes of one who isn't proven or reliable:

Let me share that which was related to me via one international business interest with strong ties to the nations highlighted in the following scenario:

According to this source, President Obama had a mid-level U.S. official meet with a Chinese officer in 2011 to find out if the Chinese were open to a land and resource swap for debt forgiveness. The upshot of this is that the Chinese are now engaging in experimental “farming” and “scientific” studies in several locations in the U.S. (in various states). The personnel involved are all Chinese military, and the plan is to use these as the base for the expansion of “land settlements” in payment of the U.S. debt to China.

Also in 2011, the Bank of China reportedly sent a team to the U.S. to do land analysis and valuations based on resources that have been identified on federally held lands. The group was tasked to visit various preselected sites, including some on the Gulf of Mexico, and arrive at resource-based values between $2 trillion and $5 trillion (enough to satisfy America’s debt to China). According to this scenario, the issuing of new drilling licenses in the U.S. have been stopped on federally held land until the Chinese can be in position to take over new oil production.

As reported on Jan. 14, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke urged U.S. lawmakers to lift the country’s borrowing limit, citing scant weeks until a potentially disastrous debt default. According to my source, the United Nations and the World Bank have been given signals that they will be called upon to broker the deal with America defaulting on debt that it cannot satisfy. This is not to be a fire sale, but is to appear as the great economic rescue plan for the U.S. Thus, it will be eagerly accepted by media-addled Americans and Obama supporters.

So Obama has sold America out – literally – which will come as little surprise to many readers, this plan apparently being the brainchild of Obama’s senior adviser, Valerie Jarrett, and members of China’s Politburo Standing Committee. Thus, the under-reported but long-standing goals of Jarrett, Obama, David Axelrod and a host of communist Obama cronies to bring America under communist sway will finally come to fruition.

Such activities have been rumored over the last couple of years, but had not been substantiated. However, this data has been verified by sources I know to be reliable; in fact, I have reported on their information previously, much to the consternation of the Chinese government.

It is the Chinese who are pushing for the disarming of the American populace. They do not want to bear the brunt of the backlash from the American public when their work and aspirations are exposed. Three weeks ago, I was told that “this will happen in weeks, not months,” and it is now occurring.

Rush then writes that impeachment is not enough for Obama, despite the unsubstantiated nature of his allegations:

At this juncture, I think that impeachment is incredibly unlikely despite his treason, given what he has succeeded in getting away with under the noses of the Republican leadership. As I have been informed, there are key Republican leaders who are aware of what is transpiring between China and the Obama administration. These have been sold the notion that America is bankrupt, but that they can work with our debtors to see that an equitable settlement is reached.

The question to which this gives rise, of course, is: Equitable for whom?

Is this the precursor to the Second American Revolution, or have gun sales gone through the roof for no apparent reason and toward no apparent objective (such as “to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution”)? Are heretofore sane, sober citizens of this republic taking leave of their senses en masse, or are they quietly and methodically preparing to stop our Union, to which thousands have given their lives, from being torn asunder?

I lean toward the latter. God help us all, and God bless America.

Does James Garrow, executive director of Pink Pagoda Girls -- where Rush is the "Vice-President Administration and Strategic Alliances" -- think Rush's hateful and conspiratorial rantings reflect well on his organization? Apparently so, since he's still employed there.

We've documented how CNSNews.com insists on calling any attempt at immigration reform "amnesty" even though none of the proposals forwarded do not fit the definition of the word. Now, another MRC employee wants in on that action.

Clay Waters complains in a Jan. 14 MRC TimesWatch item that the New York Times "has long been pushing for immigration 'reform' that would include amnesty for illegal immigrants and a path to citizenship." Earth to Waters: If there's a path to citizenship, it is by definition not amnesty, which implies no preconditions.

Waters followed that up with a Jan. 16 item again insisting that the Times backs "immigration 'reform,' involving mass amnesty for illegals in the United States. " Again, Waters offered no evidence that what the Times supports fits the dictionary definition of amnesty.

WND Still Telling Lies About Texas School CurriculumTopic: WorldNetDaily

John Griffing uses a Jan. 13 WorldNetDaily article to repeat misleading claims and outright lies about a Texas school curriculum while largely ignoring that his attacks have been debunked.

Griffing (pictured) begins by asserting that the "controversial" Texas CSCOPE online curriculum teaches that “Allah is God.”He goes on to assert that "CSCOPE lessons promote Islam, teaching conversion methods and presenting verses from the Quran that denigrate other faiths" and that "the Boston Tea Party is likened to an act of terrorism on par with 9/11."

As we've documented, Griffing is simply repeating a chain email attacking the program, and even before Griffing wrote his first misleading article attacking CSCOPE, a Texas education official gave the members of one Dallas-area school board that had received the chain email "a 72-page handout listing every religious reference in the CSCOPE curriculum, from kindergarten to high school." That report debunks Griffing's claims about CSCOPE "promoting" Islam.

Griffing makes no mention of this handout in his article, even though it addresses the accusations he makes -- and it's likely he ignores it because it undermines the premise of his article.

Griffing goes on to state that "The CSCOPE website has posted a response to concerns about certain lesson plans, including an extensive discussion of the Boston Tea Party." But he doesn't link to CSCOPE's response, nor does he say what it contains. (A copy of it is in the handout, which may be another reason why Griffing doesn't want his readers to know about it.)

Griffing

In CSCOPE World History/Social Studies, Lesson 2, Unit 3 under the heading, “Classical Rome,” students are told that Christianity is a “cult,” and given a link to a BBC article saying the early Christians were “cannibals,” i.e. the Eucharist, which students are then led to conclude is the reason for Roman persecution.

Griffing is simply lying here. At no point does the handout he links to describe Christianity as a "cult" -- indeed, the word "cult" does not exist in the handout. Here's what the BBC article actually says about Christianity and cannibalism:

Why were Christians persecuted? Much seems to have depended on local governors and how zealously or not they pursued and prosecuted Christians. The reasons why individual Christians were persecuted in this period were varied. In some cases they were perhaps scapegoats, their faith attacked where more personal or local hostilities were at issue.

Contemporary pagan and Christian sources preserve other accusations levelled against the Christians. These included charges of incest and cannibalism, probably resulting from garbled accounts of the rites which Christians celebrated in necessary secrecy, being the agape (the ‘love-feast’) and the Eucharist (partaking of the body and blood of Christ).

The article reports that early Christians were accused of being cannibals as a pretense for persection -- not that they are cannibals.

Griffing has also picked WND's penchant for untraceable anonymous sources. He claims that a "source in the Texas education system" says that "operatives in the U.S. Department of Education are actively pursuing CSCOPE as a way around the Texas legislative process." Given that his article is already filled with lies, there's not reason to believe Griffing about this, either.

This is an incredibly shoddy article, even by WND's abysmal standards. You'd think WND would have learned its lesson in the Clark Jones lawsuit about fact-checking submissions from freelancers, but apparently not.

Now, along comes one of the great frauds of our time, Colin “Putz” Powell. For years, Gen. Putz has used the Republican Party to boost his career, with nary a negative word about the GOP.

But all that ended when a black presidential candidate came along – a candidate with virtually no credentials other than his ties to notorious anti-American radicals. Gen. Putz quickly jumped on the race bandwagon and enthusiastically supported him. For sure, it was “racism, straight up.”

[...]

Gen. Putz then went on to complain that some Republicans had dared to question Barack Obama’s birth certificate. As with his credentials, how dare anyone question his place of birth, even though he refused to allow anyone to see his birth certificate for years, then finally “settled” the matter by having a multi-layered PDF version of it posted on the Internet.

Gen. Putz also cavalierly alluded to Sarah Palin’s statement that Obama was “shuckin’ and jiving” on the Benghazi issue. Sorry, but as painful as it may be for the far left to hear it, the truth is that Obama shamelessly goes into his shuck-and-jive act whenever it suits his purposes – especially when he addresses black audiences or labor-union events.

But Gen. Putz also has a sense of humor, which was on full display when he lamented that a “significant shift to the right” in the Republican Party has produced “two losing presidential campaigns.” He then added, “I think the Republican Party right now is having an identity problem” and that “if it’s just going to represent the far right wing of the political spectrum, I think the party is in difficulty.”

First of all, Gen. Putz, the Republican Party has been shifting to the left – not the right – for at least the last 25 years – so much so that it literally handed Obama another four years to carry out his anti-American plans when millions of Republicans refused to vote in 2012. Listen up, Gen. Putz: The Republican Party is “in difficulty” because it has shifted in the direction of the Romneys, the McCains, the Boehners and the McConnells.

[...]

So, am I ready to anoint Colin Powell chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Putzes? Not so fast. Let’s be fair to hard cases like Putz Buffett, Putz Christie and Putz Boehner. After all, these men have invested a lot of time honing the art of putzing and have shown no signs of letting up. I say, putzes of the world, unite!

The Media Research Center loves to give conservatives who dare to deviate from the right-wing party line the Heather treatment, questioning their conservative credentials with attitudes that range from snark to viciousness. Now the MRC's head honcho wants in on the act.

Brent Bozell's Jan. 16 column is one big Heather-fest, starting off with his usual whining:

The Republican Party is desperately in need of some good advice. It needs to return to Ronald Reagan conservatism and give America a two-party system, not a tinny echo of Obama. But our liberal media keep desperately inviting fake Republicans to offer advice to the GOP.

They want to create a new Republican Party, one that rejects the principles of the man who championed freedom.

After complaining about Michael Bloomberg -- who was a Republican only for the purpose of running for mayor of New York City and is currently an independent, thus making him a poor example -- Bozell turns his Heathering sights on Colin Powell:

Exhibit B: Colin Powell, who voted for Obama twice, but still insists he's a Reagan Republican. Indeed, since becoming a Republican, all he's done is criticize the GOP. NBC brought him on "Meet the Press" to declare, "If it's just going to represent the far right-wing of the political spectrum, I think the Party is in difficulty. I'm a moderate but I'm still a Republican."

Powell thinks he's a Republican, and the GOP has an "identity problem." But the "identity problem" is Powell's — voting for Obama is neither Republican nor "moderate." Today's Republican establishment isn't to the right of Reagan. It is to the left of the man who won one of the largest landslides in history with an unequivocal conservative agenda.

In other words: Powell is not as rigidly dogmatic as Bozell is, therefore he's not a real Republican.

By the way, what's happening with Bozell's big threat to "start looking for a new home" if Republicans agreed to a tax hike in fiscal cliff negotiations (which they did)? If Bozell is still defending the honor of the Republican Party, that means his threat was just a petulant bluff.

Bozell goes on to give the Heather treatment to another heretic, Republican strategist Mike Murphy:

Mike Murphy and his friends in the media are on the very same page: To "modernize" the Republican Party is to put conservatism through a shredder. On NBC back in November, Murphy warned if "we don't modernize conservatism, we can go extinct ... We've got to get kind of a party view of America that's not right out of Rush Limbaugh's dream journal."

By the by, how does one "modernize" principles?

Limbaugh's dream is Reagan's dream. You can't be against Rush and for Reagan.

Unless Bozell is tellins us that Reagan called women sluts and advocated conducting abortions with guns, we're pretty sure you can separate the two.